LAHORE – Kissan Hall, located in a small street on the Mozang Road, is a place where Lahore’s re-emerging left (Leftist Parties, that is) convenes. It is the weekly host to the Marxism Day School and regular conventions for various Leftist political parties. On Wednesday, the Worker’s Party Pakistan organised a seminar, rather ironically titled, ‘National security and Pakistan.’ Settled at the speakers seats were Farooq Tariq (Labour Party Pakistan), Aasim Sajjad Akhtar (Worker’s Party Pakistan) and Naeem Shakir (Worker’s Party Pakistan General Secretary). Each stepped up to the podium to deliver his thoughts before the event delved into a discussion session with the audience (a hundred-strong including students, lawyers, activists, professors and political workers).
The basis of the national
security state: religion: Farooq Tariq, Labour Party president, was the first to be invited to speak. “Pakistan was created,” he said, “but the contract with the people was not met. The State’s foundations were laid on religious grounds. And here is where the decline started and the first tenant of the national security state was laid.” “The integration of the two-nation theory into the idea of Pakistan was at the core of the problems that emerged,” Farooq said, “but it was a theory that history quickly discarded. East Pakistan became Bangladesh and the idea that being Muslim were enough to form a nation was practically refuted.”
“But the lesson of the break-up of Pakistan was never learnt. The sovereignty of the nations that occupied the land of Pakistan was infringed upon repeatedly under the doctrine of national security,” he said, “the army was sent in to take over their resources.””This doctrine was continued under the doctrine of neoliberalism, which became key in state policy since 1991,” he said. “This doctrine amounted to the privatisation of natural resources which followed the privatisation of national institutions,” he said, “and all of these were meant to exploit the people to which these resources belonged, leaving them economically crippled.”
“This doctrine has hurt together-ness to the extent that now only the Punjabi middle class believes in Pakistaniat,” he said. Critiquing media and media intellectuals, he said, “the bourgeoisie media now projects liberal forces. But in Pakistan, liberalism is the new face of imperialism.” Farooq also stressed the need for the left to critique ‘capitalism’s war on terrorism.’ He said, “to be silent on the military operations against fundamentalists is criminal. The military cannot be allowed to murder people at its’ discretion under the rubric of national security.”
Questioning the national security paradigm: At this Farooq stepped down and ceded the podium to Aasim Sajjad Akhtar of the Worker’s Party.
“Progressive forces are deeply divided,” he said, “at this critical moment there is a need for them to politically unite. But then the question is: what are we to unite on?” Aasim threw up two questions to the audience, “What is the State? What is it’s role?” He moved on to say, “it is known that the question of identity in Pakistan has not been solved yet. But before we discuss that, we must decide one thing. State’s do not have people, people have States.” “People are changing, yes, but they are the only stable reality.
States are made and unmade in history,” he said. “If we realise this then the intertwining of the atom bomb with our identity on the grounds of Islam – or that every small matter is projected as an issue of ‘saving the country’ is where the problem lies,” he said, “and the heart of the problem lies in Punjab. The peripheries have always had question about Pakistan, Islam and claims of national security.” “The periphery provinces of Pakistan have a long history marred by operations by the military,” he said, “and they remember these well.”
Aasim went on to critique the left for “paying so much attention to religious forces that we forget the issue of Balochistan.”
“The myth of India remains dominant in the public’s imagination,” he said, “every time someone raises his voice it is shot down by calling him an Indian agent. What we must realise is that this is the product of a carefully manufactured ‘national security doctrine’.” He further said, “the support of members of the left for America when it claims to fight fanatics is misled. Has America cut off its’ strategic partnership with the Pakistan Army? If not, then, the strategy of America would remain the same.” “A new agenda, a new social contract is needed. The doctrine of national security must be discarded and the State must be returned to the people,” he said. A full stop to people’s
oppression: Aasim completed his speech and ceded the podium to Workers Party General Secretary Naeem Shakir. Naeem began his speech by saying, “a full stop must be put on the oppression of the people by the State.” “The discourse of national security must be broken out of,” he said, “under its guise a debt of $55 billion has been accumulated and common people are being crippled.” “The army has been able to gain nothing from its relationship with the CIA, who has refused to stop the drone attacks,” he said. “This proves the fallacy of the myth of national security that the army has preached in Pakistan.”
“The religion and state linkage must be disarticulated,” he said, “it is so intertwined in our education system that it can no longer produce normal people. The issue of national security is not the issue of national security, it is the issue of the looting of the people in the name of national security.” Concluding, he said, “it is time to denounce the doctrine of national security. It is time to set new foundations for a new State – a State for the people.” Here Naeem ceded the podium and the forum opened for discussion.
